Small Business Technology Recession Tips

Consider the minimum technology that is needed today to run any company. A Small company needs computers, applications (Word, Excel, QuickBooks) internet access, printers, phones, PDA’s and a website. If any one of theses technology items were not working correctly. Your business could come to a halt or be severely impacted. Repairing or replacing these items creates unexpected expenses such as loss of productivityConsider the small business technology budget. Replace only if broken is usually the motto. Consider Proactive Services.Are your computers still under warranty? If yes can we extend the warranty on them? If not can we get an extended warranty. I know HP and Dell allow you to extend the warranties on their hardware. It is cheaper to extend the warranty of an existing computer, server and printer then to buy a new one.Place your computers in energy savings mode to reduce electrical expenses. Check the Internet for tips on placing your monitors and computers in energy savings mode.Consider free software to manage your computers. AVG for antivirus and Spybot for spyware are a great start. Open Office is another.If you use a computer consultant ask if they have pre-purchased blocks of time available. These hourly blocks of time usually come with a discounted rate and no expiration date.Shop your around for the best Internet price.Don’t skimp when it comes to maintaining your business network. Consider an online backup or Managed Services for you computers and Servers. For a flat fee per month most computer consultants will maintain your entire network from top to bottom.

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Innovative Internet Marketing Ideas – Advantages and Disadvantages

If you are a business owner or even if you are about to become one, there is a good chance that you have heard of innovative internet marketing ideas before. Although you may have heard of these ideas before, do you know what they are? Do you know what they can do for you and your business? Are you using the same old marketing techniques used by everyone else in the industry and struggling for traffic and business? Lets examine the advantages and disadvantages of using innovative internet marketing ideas to promote your business.Before you start to examine the advantages and disadvantages of innovative Internet marketing, it may be a good idea to examine exactly what it is. As a business owner or a soon to be business owner, you likely already know what Internet marketing is. Marketing is getting your business out into the general public; it is done by targeting your intended audience, your customers. That targeting is done by way of the internet; thus the title, internet marketing. It is also important to understand how to be innovative and how that ties into internet marketing. Innovation is another word that is often used to describe something new; therefore, innovative Internet marketing ideas are relatively new ideas, particularly ideas that have just recently been developed.When it comes to innovative internet marketing ideas and your business, you will find that there are a number of benefits. One of those benefits is the ease of use. Even if you do not have a large amount of computer experience, you will often find the internet easy to use. Whether you are interested in making your business an online website, starting a business newsletter, or conducting a demographic analysis online, you should easily be able to do so. Even if you do not know how to start up your own newsletter, do an online poll, or make your own website, you should be able to learn, often in no time at all. The internet offers information on starting all kinds of businesses.Once you have chosen your niche, or specific area or product that you would like to promote or sell, try searching the internet for similar products or services. In this way, you can determine any potential competition. If competition exists, you can decide if you want to compete, or find a complimentary product or service to promote. If competition doesn’t exist, and there is a market looking for answers to a question, this would be a perfect niche market to begin a business in.In addition to using the Internet to put your innovative marketing ideas to into motion, you can also use the Internet to find those ideas. Using the Internet to find innovative Internet marketing ideas is a relatively quick and easy process. By staying up-to-date on the latest business and marketing news or by performing a standard Internet search, you can easily be kept in the loop, when it comes to Internet marketing ideas, particularly new ones. If you have a niche that you are interested in, often signing up for related newsletters or chat rooms can lead to the discovery of a new business idea or marketing technique. If you put those ideas into motion, as soon as you hear about them, your business may be given an edge above the rest of its competition. In fact, a new innovative Internet marketing idea may be just what you need to get your business up and running.What is also nice about innovative Internet marketing is that, although it is relatively easy to develop your own marketing ideas and execute them, you don’t necessarily have to. For example, there are a large number of individuals who specialize in Internet marketing. Those individuals, who are often referred to as internet marketing specialists, can be found online. An internet marketing specialist is a trained professional who can not only come up with new ways to market your internet business online, but they can also execute those ideas for you, for a reasonable fee. Whether you don’t have the time to develop an effective marketing plan or if you want to avoid the hassle of doing so, an internet marketing specialist may be able to offer you assistance.Although there are a large number of advantages to using innovative marketing ideas to promote your business, there are also a few disadvantages to doing so as well. One of those disadvantages is the fact that innovative marketing ideas are new. With new marketing ideas, they have sometimes yet to be tested or proven; therefore, you are really given no guarantees that a new, innovative Internet marketing idea really will work. Of course, it is important to remember that with business, there are always risks. Trying a new innovative internet marketing idea may not work out to your advantage, but it may also be the best thing that has ever happened to your business.

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Why a Client-Focused Web Development Vendor Is Beneficial to Your Business

When it comes to web development, you have three options:1. Find a Freelancer that can complete your project.
2. Hire a vendor to complete your web work on a contract-basis.
3. Stick with a company that grows with your business.There are pros and cons to many of the options above but the key thing to look for is Are They Client-Focused?The speed of which technology, web trends, and mobile trends innovate accelerates faster each year. The best way to keep up is by collaborating and partnering rather than finding resources on an ad-hoc basis. Let’s take a look at each of these options:1. Find a Freelancer that can complete your projectFor any start-up or small business, this may seem like the most viable and cost-effective option. A Freelancer will usually complete your work at the fraction of the cost but with the added expense of time. Finding the right Freelancer to complete your web development project may be difficult especially when it comes down to experience and the style of web design they specialize in. If you and the Freelancer don’t agree on the design style, it may be time to find another Freelancer but this also costs valuable time.Another issue arises when your company grows. A Freelancer may not be able to keep up with the speed and growth that your start-up or small business faces. So at some point, there will be a time when you might need to search for other options.2. Hire a company to complete your web work on a contract basis.This option definitely gives you the resources you need and the added experience to get a job done quickly and efficiently but may rack up that bill at the end of the project. Having a Web Development company gives you options to explore different web designs, styles, templates, and give you the front-end and back-end resources you may be looking for in a web development project. Due to the added resources and options available, you may be looking at a bill that’s almost two to three times the cost of a Freelancer.The other cost will be in the long-run if you hire an organization to complete your website on a contract-basis. The con to this is that as your start-up or small business grows, your web development company will need to understand your organization, the changes it has gone through, re-visit your website as if they have never touched it, and re-tailor your website to suit your needs, all from scratch. You are basically starting from the ground-up again. This is costly as technology, web, and mobile trends grow faster each year, it’s not a matter of whether your web development company can keep up, but a matter of whether your company can keep up.So how do you balance these issues?3. Stick with a company that grows with your businessFinding a client-focused web development company may be your key to success. Whether it is a smaller web development company that can meet your budget of a start-up or small business, or if it is a larger web development company for larger businesses with a higher capacity.The benefits of a web development company that sticks by you are endless, to name a few, a client-focused web development company can:Keep up with the growing trends of technology, web design, web trends, mobile design, and mobile trends alongside your organizationBoth companies grow together as each company looks to each other for resources.Save you both time and money as they will already understand your company and how to tailor web designs and content to match your industry and buyer personas.Help your company grow faster than ever, as they will understand the trends of the web and mobile technology space and provide those services quickly and easily to their own clients.Be your one-stop shop for all your web needs.Choosing the right option in the beginning can save you a lot of pain and hassle. Not to mention valuable dollars your company could use towards other initiatives to help your start-up or small business soar. Reap the benefits of sticking with one web development company to help maximize the rewards returned from a web development vendor that grows with your company.

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